Sales of new business-class smartphone BlackBerry Bold 9900 have been launched in Latvia.

In addition to BlackBerry’s classical full keyboard, the phone is also equipped with high-resolution touch screen, Lita Grafa, representative of smartphone vendor Bite, indicates to BNN.

Martins Stankevichs, expert of BlackBerry, describes the new smartphone with three words – power, comfort and design.

«The phone is equipped with the latest OS7 operating system, so its performance and speed is awesome. The new Bold has so far the most convenient keyboard among all BlackBerry phones, as it is large and very comfortable. People writing a lot of e-mails or browsing social networks on a daily basis will appreciate this. Moreover, together with Bite’s offered BlackBerry service, no additional fee is charged for the e-mail and data transmission,» Stankevics says.

He points out the phone has built-in high-definition 720p video camera and 5MP photo camera. «Of course, BlackBerry has also retained its classic advantages – messenger that provides continuous contact with family or friends, unique e-mail service and data security systems,» Stankevichs says.

However, as one of the drawbacks, the expert mentions rather noisy keyboard, indicating that in a quiet room the button clicks may seem rather loud.

Russian President Vladimir Putin paid a visit this Wednesday to Kaliningrad, the westernmost point of Russia, but the reports about his trip in the Russian enclave and over the border in Lithuania were strikingly different.

Latvian airBaltic airline carried 393,312 passengers in July 2017, which is 21% more than the same period last year. The number of passengers carried by airBaltic remains the highest it has ever been in the airline’s history, BNN was informed by the company.

U.S. Air Force Brigade’s Task Force Phoenix helicopters, which are stationed in Latvia as part of Atlantic Resolve operation, will be performing low-altitude flights from 16:00 to 18:00 from Lielvarde to Dobele on Friday, 18 August.

An Indian citizen travelling from Moscow on a bus was caught at Terehovo border control point in Latvia for presenting officers a fake EU family member’s resident card. No criminal process was launched. The person returned to the country he was travelling from.

From 21 August onward, Rural Support Service plans to start accepting applications for projects to receive support from European Maritime and Fisheries Fund’s action plan for development of fisheries in 2014-2020 as part of projects Innovation, Productive Investments in Aquaculture and Fishing and Aquaculture project processing.

As the Estonian Ministry of Finance wishes to boost the reputation and brand of the Baltic country's public sector, it has announced a procurement tender aimed at preparing an action plan for reaching these goals.

Because of Swedbank’s planned IT modernization work scheduled for the night to Thursday, 17 August, there may be short term problems with payment card and internet banking functionality, the bank warns.

If he became chairman of Unity, Economy Minister Arvils Aseradens would mobilize democratic forces to prevent the possibility of either Aivars Lembergs or Nils Usakovs becoming prime ministers, Aseradens said in an interview to 900 seconds programme of LNT.

The co-founder of the U.S. computer software firm Microsoft, Bill Gates, has allocated to charity 4.6 billion U.S. dollars (3.9 billion euros), which is the philanthropist's highest donation since the year 2000.

Latvia and Russia will exchange 7,000 universal permits for international cargo transports in 2017. This will be the largest universal permit volume in the past 15 years, as reported by Road Directorate.